Runaway Pt. 03

"Come on in," Rick said. "No sense standing out on the driveway."

He grabbed Noah's backpack from the trunk as Noah took mine, shaking his head as I reached for it. He slung mine over his shoulder and carried his own by the handle.

"Your house is beautiful," I said to Sean as we walked up.

"Nothing to do with me. Rick's the rich one, I'm more of a kept woman." Sean laughed flamboyantly as Rick rolled his eyes.

"Don't listen to him. I'm a glorified servant. He's damn good at what he does."

Noah saved me from having to ask an awkward question to my own brother.

"What do you do, Sean?"

"Architecture. I draw houses, people build them."

"Give yourself some credit," Rick urged. "He designs custom homes for people with far too much money. Designed this one, too."

I could see every bit of Sean's personality in the home as we entered it, though he insisted it was Rick who had made most of the decisions. Once inside and away from the other homes in the neighbourhood, it didn't seem that small, and every touch, from the colour of the floors to the art on the walls, was meticulously perfect.

What surprised me most were the small details that I didn't expect. A rosary hung from the edge of a mirror in the front hall. In the kitchen, a cross was prominently displayed over the window. I wouldn't have expected Sean to keep any sort of religion in his life after how our father treated him, but small things here and there showed he had.

The most surprising detail of all was a small portrait that hung on the fridge.

I remembered the photo being taken. We had gone into Winnipeg for some reason as a family, and my mom insisted on going to Sears to have a "real family photo done, just the four of us." I was maybe six or seven at the time. She begged and begged for all of us to smile, and we did... for the first ten or so times. On the last one, Sean had whispered in my ear to make a silly face. When Mom saw the photo, she had nearly cried laughing at my crossed eyes and stuck-out tongue and Sean's teeth poking out over his upper lip. She bought one or two of the nice family photos, but the rest of them were of that last picture, much to my father's dismay.

A smile crossed my face as I looked at the photo. Sean and I were wearing matching sweaters, knitted monstrosities that I recalled being incredibly itchy. Mom was in her nicest Sunday dress. I couldn't remember what my father had worn, and it didn't matter. The magnet that held it to the fridge was covering him almost entirely.

"Remember how pissed Dad got?" Sean asked, coming up behind me.

"'You spent good money on this?! What kind of family will people think we are?!'" I said, rolling my eyes. "I think you've improved the photo with the magnet, to be honest."

"Couldn't cut him out without losing part of your head," he explained. "Figured it was the next best thing."

"It's great."

"Hey, you see this, Noah? Come here." Rick waved Noah across the kitchen. "I almost didn't recognize Lacey in the train station. This is the only photo I've ever seen of her."

I laughed as Noah came up and snorted at the photo.

"You haven't changed a bit." He nudged me softly and I mimicked the face at him, sticking my tongue out as far as it would go.

"I cannot wait to hear all the stories you have about her, Noah," Sean said.

I tried very, very hard not to blush as I thought about some of the stories Noah had about me. I doubted very much that Sean would want to hear all the stories Noah had.

"Maybe Noah could wait in the living room while we have a quick talk," Mom said from behind us.

The laughter in the kitchen faded and I felt my shoulders tense.

"You know, I was going to fire up the grill and make some steaks for dinner," Rick said hurriedly. "Noah, you drink? Grab a couple beers and you can help me on the patio."

"Oh no, Rick, you can—"

"That's a great idea," interrupted Sean as he glared at Mom.

Noah awkwardly helped as Rick pulled ingredients and steaks from the fridge, shyly asking for just a bottle of water instead of the beer before carrying as much as he could out the back door. I mouthed an apology at him when he caught my eye and he nodded, a tight smile on his lips.

Once they were gone, I sat at the kitchen table.

"Beer or wine, Lacey?" Sean asked.

"Wine."

He got a glass for each of us and sat beside Mom, across from me. She looked slightly scandalized at the glass in front of me, and even more when I took a large sip.

We were all quiet for a moment, no one sure of where to start.

"Have you talked to your father?" Mom finally asked.

"He disowned me."

She recoiled as though I had slapped her in the face.

"When did you talk to him?"

"Two nights ago."

"He actually said that?" Sean asked. "Like, he said—"

"Well, he said I was dead to him for being a whore and if I hung up on him, I could never come back." I shrugged. "So I hung up on him."

Sean muffled a snort as Mom pressed her lips together.

"Lacey, I'm so... I can't believe..." She stopped, her voice catching. "Your father is... he... that... that jerk!"

I couldn't help it. I burst out laughing, unable to contain my emotions any longer. Sean joined in next, and Mom followed shortly after, until the three of us were howling at the kitchen table.

It was ridiculous. Ridiculous and hilarious and heartbreaking, the three of us sitting around his table and laughing at the fact that my father, my brother's father, my mom's husband, had broken our family so it could reform in the iteration it was at that moment.

My hands found my head as tears started to fall. I didn't know when, exactly, the laughter turned to sobs, but suddenly Mom was beside me with her arm around my shoulders and I was reaching for her, crying on her shoulder like a child as she comforted me.

"It's okay," she murmured. "It's all right. We're here, together."

I sniffed and nodded, pulling back from her. "I'm okay. I'm fine."

"Lacey..." She hesitated, then tentatively touched the silver cross Noah had gotten for me. "Where... what happened to Nana's necklace?"

My face burned. "It's, um... it's a long story."

"Maybe we should get the stories out in the open," Sean said. "Get us all on the same page."

"Yes," Mom shuffled back to her chair, wiping her own face as she sat back down. "What happened, Lacey? When you left for Winnipeg?"

I started from the very beginning, that day that seemed so long ago but in actuality was just barely a week gone. I told them how Roger had tricked me, how terrified I was to go back home and face my failure. The moment Sean had popped into my head and how certain I was that he would be in Vancouver, and how little planning I'd done before getting on the train headed west.

I didn't tell them about the drugged drink. When Sean asked how I met Noah, I glossed over the part in the dining car and said I'd told him what I was doing and he said he'd look out for me.

We didn't tell the story in turns. It evolved, starting with one person and moving to the next as the tales entwined. Mom picked up the story when I mentioned the phone call in Edmonton.

"Your father and I were bringing coffee to the senior's center. When we pulled out of the Timmy's, Dennis commented that he was sure he had just seen Roger's truck pull into the parking lot. I said it must have just been a similar one, but he was certain that it had that horrible window sticker on it."

"Calvin pissing on Ford," I said.

Sean laughed as Mom rolled her eyes.

"Yes, that one. When we got home, he was about to call you when the doorbell rang. Kristen was there and she told me how she had seen Roger the day before, what she had heard, but that she had never heard back from you and she was worried. I told her we'd let her know when we heard back and Dennis called right away."

"And I didn't tell you anything useful," I said. "Daddy was so mad and I just—"

"He heard Noah in the background and he lost it." Mom shook her head. "He tried calling back as soon as you hung up but—"

"I was bawling. Noah was there for me, he... I would have gotten into trouble without him."

She continued on. My father kept trying to call while she tried to figure out where I was going. They had fought the entire day as she told him to calm down, sure I would call back. When they woke up the next morning and I still hadn't called, he had lost his mind. She had suggested filling out a missing persons report, but he had screamed at her that he didn't want the embarrassment. Desperate, Mom had told my father she was going to ask Kristen some more questions, drove three blocks down the street, parked, and called Sean.

"I thought you had died," Sean said, not a trace of humour on his face. "Mom called and just kept mumbling 'she's gone, she's gone' and I thought you..." He shook his head, shivering. "She finally got the whole story out. We both thought she was grasping at straws, thinking you'd reach out to me, but I promised her I'd try to get a hold of you. Rick was ready to ask his boss to lend him money to get a private investigator."

"I was considering getting one to find you," I mumbled. "You're not online anywhere."

"I don't go by that name anymore," Sean said. "I guess you wouldn't know that. But I changed it after I left. It's Sean Lemieux now."

"Lemieux? Like Mario Lemieux?"

He burst out laughing. "Yeah, exactly."

"I should've known. He was your favourite player."

"Only because I thought he was hot. Closest I'd get to being Mrs. Lemieux."

I giggled as Mom smiled tensely.

"Well, anyway, I kept trying and when you finally answered I nearly shit myself. And then when you told me you thought I was in Vancouver, I nearly had a heart attack. As soon as I got off the phone with you, I called Mom and said you were scared to call home because of Dad, but that you were with Noah. Which, of course, she nearly had a heart attack over because she had no idea who Noah was."

"I asked everyone," Mom said. "Kristen had never heard of him. A couple from church have a son named Noah, but he works at the grocery store and I had seen him that day. When I called Sean back later to see if he'd heard from you, I... well..."

Her face changed, grief and sorrow and anger mixing up in her eyes as she cast them down at the table.

Sean touched her hand softly.

"It's okay, Mom."

She took a breath. "I thought your father had gone out. I shouldn't have called Sean from the house, but I wasn't thinking straight. I told him what I found out, talked to him for a while and asked him to tell me if he heard from you again, and when I turned around..."

Sean picked up the story, summarizing quietly. My father had heard enough of Mom's conversation to figure out who she was talking to, and he was livid. He screamed at her, berated her, and when she screamed back that he had pushed both her children away, he had grabbed her and pushed her into the wall hard enough that she saw stars.

Her scream had been loud enough that the neighbours heard. When they pounded on the door, my father had taken a breath, straightened his shirt, and went out the back door to his car. Mom didn't move until she heard him drive down the road. She gathered herself and went to the door to tell the neighbours that everything was fine. Then she went upstairs, packed up as many of her belongings and mine as she could, and gotten in her car.

"Sean told me to leave. For years." Her voice was raggedly quiet. "I... I never could. Somehow, knowing I had two children who were strong enough to run away from that man made me realize I could, too."

Her statement made me angry rather than relieved. The sudden change in emotion confused me and I frowned, trying to determine what my instincts were trying to tell me.

"She called from the road," Sean continued. "That drive is a full 24 hours if you don't stop. You made it in, what, 26?"

"Something like that." Mom shook her head. "It was very stupid and dangerous of me. I slept on the side of the road for a couple hours and kept driving."

"We didn't know if we should tell you or not." There was pain on Sean's face as he spoke. "You're my baby sister and I always have and always will love you, but I haven't seen you in ten years. I didn't know if you'd take the news well."

"And I felt like I didn't know you at all," Mom said. I bit my lip hard as I tried not to tear up again, torrents of guilt rushing through me as she spoke. "I don't mean that in a bad way, sweetie. It was just so unlike you, and I felt like I had failed, like my daughter was running from me as much as she was running from Dennis. I was so scared and so worried... and so proud."

"Once Mom got here, we decided we'd wait until you were in Montreal to bring it all up. It just... it felt like the safe choice." Sean's eyes were nervous. "We didn't intend to trick you or lie to you, Lace. The intent was—"

"The intent was to take my opinion out of the decision." My voice was harsher than I intended and Mom visibly winced.

"No, it was..." Sean stopped and took a breath. "I can see how that was a consequence of what we did. I'm sorry."

"It's fine."

It wasn't, but there was nothing to be done now. I had been on a train, learning and growing and changing with Noah, losing my virginity and going on dates and fucking around while my family had fallen apart. My leaving had been the catalyst; if anyone was to blame for the mess, it was me, and if there was anyone to be blamed for not being involved in the clean-up, it was also me. I ran away. It was stupid to expect they would wait for my opinion when they didn't even know where I was.

"If you say so," said Sean. "So, that's how Mom ended up here. She got in a couple days ago and we've just been trying to sort things out while waiting for you."

I thought perhaps I wouldn't have to share the rest of my story, since the major drama had been resolved, but Mom wasn't having it.

"So when Sean called you, you were driving? What happened to the train?"

"It broke down in Jasper," I replied. "We... well, Noah had some... friends. In Hinton. They lent us their car."

"They lent you a whole car?" Sean's eyebrows were raised. "And were okay with him driving it all the way to Vancouver?"

I shifted uncomfortably. Lying did not come easy to me, and I wasn't sure how to gloss over the rougher parts of the story with their attention laser-focused on me.

"It was a strange situation," I said. "When we got the call from Sean—"

"Wait, you didn't answer my question," Sean said.

"It's not important."

"It sounds important."

"Why would it sound important?"

"Because you're avoiding the question, which makes me think it was important."

My knee bounced as I glared at Sean.

"This conversation only works if we're all being honest," Mom said softly.

"You already don't like Noah," I said quietly. "I feel like you'll judge him without understanding everything."

"It's not that I don't like Noah—"

"Mom." I looked at her, suddenly very tired. "You literally just said that this only works if we're all being honest."

"I understand you met him in some very unique circumstances. That doesn't mean he's not a good person, it just means that... well, maybe there are some things about him that you've overlooked."

I opened my mouth to respond, but Sean cut me off.

"How'd you guys get the car, Lacey?"

"His friend lent it to him." I sighed and closed my eyes. "Just, he maybe didn't tell them we intended to go all the way to Vancouver."

Mom's lips pressed together tightly.

"See, you—"

"It's an understandable concern," Sean said quickly, cutting me off. "But just because it was a questionable decision doesn't mean he's a bad person. It's... let's just leave it there, okay?"

Mom and I both nodded.

"And your necklace?" she asked stiffly. "Nana's cross?"

My hand fluttered to the silver replacement Noah had got me.

"I gave it to his friends."

"Lacey!"

"It was to make up for the car."

"So you lost your grandmother's antique necklace to make up for his decision to steal a car?!"

"I chose to do it," I said fiercely. "Noah helped me more than he had to with everything."

"Like what?"

I stiffened and took a sip of wine, composing myself.

"Look, I'm not ready to talk about all of this." I stood up to leave as Sean protested.

"Wait, just wait." He held his hands out as if it would stop time. "Look. Let's... okay. Mom, Lacey's been through a rough week. She's right, we need to respect that. Lace, we just... it's hard to understand what Noah did for you if you don't tell us."

I looked at him closely, realization dawning on me. "You don't like him either."

"That's not—"

"Why can't you just trust that he's a good person? Why can't you just take my word for it?"

"I haven't talked to you for ten years!" Sean's eyes were glistening, his face twisting as he tried to maintain his cool. "I don't know you. I want to, but... it's hard to take your word when I don't know what your word means anymore."

"Noah was the one there for me when I was scared. He kept me out of trouble. He was the one hugging me when I cried, talking me through panic attacks when I was on the wrong side of the country, and making sure I was safe." I fought back my own tears, mirroring Sean's expression. "If that's not enough, then I'm sorry. But I can't tell you more right now."

"Okay." Mom's voice was soft. "You're right. We haven't been giving you the right support to feel like you can share those details without our judgement. I'm sorry."

Sean nodded, taking a calming breath. "Please stay, Lacey."

Hesitantly, I sat back down. I tried to keep the anger and iciness from my voice, but the rest of my story came out flat and cold.

"We returned the car. Then took the bus to Edmonton so we didn't have to wait in Hinton for two days. Caught the train there, got an upgrade so we had a bed... beds... to sleep in. They said tickets would be cheaper if we bought them in Toronto and that was true, but the train was sold out. Noah had friends in Toronto that we stayed with."

Both of them caught my slip-up about the bed on the train, but neither said anything as I sipped my wine.

"I called Daddy when we were in Toronto. He didn't tell me that Mom wasn't there, even though I asked to talk to her. I told him I didn't want to come home and he said he didn't know where he went wrong, since Sean was..."

"Let me guess. He called me a faggot."

I nodded. "And called me a whore. He said if I hung up, I would be dead to him. I told him... I said I forgave him. And then I hung up."

"You forgave him?" Mom said quietly.

"I forgave him for me, not for him." I looked at her, my expression cold but softening as I saw the look on her face. "I didn't know about what happened to you. He didn't even tell me you had left."

She nodded, not speaking.

"Then we came here." I finished my glass of wine. "That's it."

"That's it for the story, or you need more wine?" Sean joked awkwardly.

"Both," I replied, not really joking. It was enough of a break in the tension that we all laughed, however.

"I'll take a glass, too," Mom said. "I think... I think we all need more wine."

That was the understatement of the year.

**

Of everyone aside from myself, it was Rick who got along best with Noah.

After refilling our wine and chatting about menial, unimportant details, Sean went to the patio to see how dinner was coming along. As he opened the door, we were greeted with a gale of laughter coming from outside.

"Yeesh, it sounds way more fun out here," Sean said as he stepped out of the kitchen. "I should've joined this party instead!"

I agreed with him completely.

"It'll still be a while," I heard Rick say from outside. "Potatoes are taking longer than I thought."